Chechnya could be key to Putin's future

Published: Monday, January 03, 2000

WASHINGTON {AP} Though his hard line on Chechnya has driven up his popularity, acting Russian President Vladimir Putin's political future may depend on whether he settles the conflict peacefully, top Clinton administration officials said Sunday.

Having ascended to the presidency following Boris Yeltsin's surprise New Year's Eve resignation, Putin is the early favorite in the March elections. But a Chechnian quagmire may bring him down, the officials said.

"Chechnya now is a dilemma," National Security Adviser Samuel Berger said on ABC's "This Week." "If it goes on too long, or if it begins to cause increasing Russian casualties, as we seem to be seeing now, with an intensified resistance, this could become something that mires Putin down, and the wave he rode up could become the wave that engulfs him."

Putin has been an outspoken supporter of Russia's military intervention in Chechnya, defending it against criticism in the West. On his first full day as acting president, he visited Russian forces in Chechnya to praise them for the campaign.

But the Chechnya war won't be settled on the battlefield but around a negotiating table, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

The outcome of the war also will set the tone for relations between Moscow and other nations, President Clinton said in a farewell essay to Yeltsin published in Time magazine.

Meanwhile, Clinton administration officials said the peaceful handoff of power to Putin bode well for Russia's democratic future.

"This transfer of power is something we believe has taken place democratically," Albright said.

Administration officials noted that Putin was a member of the KGB, the Russian spy agency, but also was part of the reformist government of the city of St. Petersburg. "He has been a prime reformer," Albright said.